They have to stay in the Bad Corner until gym class, and then Miss Simmons makes them go outside with everyone else.

It’s a cold day; Miss Simmons, who is wearing a thin cotton shirt, shivers and tells them to go ahead and start the game and then she goes back into the schoolhouse to get her sweater.

( Read more... )

On Thursday, Tommy asks if he can sit with Syx and Roxanne during lunch.

Roxanne hesitates. Tommy is pretty quiet, usually. He hasn’t ever said anything mean to her or Syx to their faces, she knows. He still joins in when everybody laughs at Syx, but-

-people can change, right? There’s good in everyone and everybody deserves a second chance.

Roxanne ( Read more... )

"A sleepover?" Roxanne's dad takes a bite of his cornflakes. "Sure, kiddo; don't see why not."

Roxanne grins and pours a second helping of Fruity Marshmallow Krispies into her own cereal bowl. Operation: Get Dad to Agree to a Sleepover With Syx Since Mom Won't has been successfully implemented.

She picks up her spoon and quickly begins to devour the ( Read more... )

“What would you like to do,” Roxanne’s mother asks at breakfast, “for your birthday party, this year, sweetheart? It’s still a while away, but I thought we should start planning early. I know it falls on one of your father’s weekends, so I was thinking you could have something here the weekend before.”
Roxanne shrugs and stirs her eggs with her fork ( Read more... )

The bus ride home is sort of terrible.

Syx doesn’t take the regular bus; he gets picked up by the prison bus, so Roxanne has to sit alone. That isn’t so very bad; she got used to it when she first befriended Syx. She knows now to sit at the front of the bus, where it’s safest-the back is where Wayne and the ‘cool’ kids congregate. They’ve never ( Read more... )

“But he didn’t do it on purpose!” Roxanne says ( Read more... )

Greetings, internet! This is a test post. ( Read more... )